Minds of the Movement
An ICNC blog on the people and power of civil resistance
Solidarity march in Brussels, 2025. Credit: About Congo.
Lire cet article en français ici.
This article is part of a REACT mini-series entitled, "Violence On and Offline: Naming It, Defying It, Surpassing It". Read our second post here.
While armed conflicts were once fought on the front lines, today social media has become a parallel battlefield. Without bombs, rifles or machetes, social media now allows anti-democratic actors to manipulate opinion, spread false narratives, and harass and demonize activists, journalists and researchers who do not share their narratives of hatred.
In this regard, the current conflict in Congo offers a telling example of the nature and scope of online disinformation, as well as the strategies that peace activists can adopt to counter it.
Fraudulent use of activist language
Marche de solidarité à Bruxelles en 2025. Source : About Congo.
Social networks are fertile ground for the malicious appropriation of activist language. Like “blue-washing”, in which a corporation exaggerates its commitment to honorable causes, or “green-washing”, in which a company falsely uses ecological arguments in its marketing, violent actors in a political conflict sometimes position themselves as defending honorable causes, while in fact inciting violence.
Since the resurgence of the Rwandan-backed M23 rebellion, individuals and organizations peacefully denouncing crimes committed by armed groups and calling for justice have faced this organized online violence. From artists singing for peace in Congo to nonviolent movements like LUCHA, to researchers working on the Congo, including those at the United Nations, peace campaigners are accused online of committing "Tutsi genocide denial," "hate speech against the Tutsi," or "allegiance to the Hutu perpetrators of the genocide."
Denis Mukwege, an emblematic figure in the struggle for peace and justice in Congo, is one of the main targets of these online smear campaigns. Winner of the 2018 Nobel Peace Prize for his care to female victims of war-related sexual violence, this Congolese gynecologist has been advocating for several years for the creation of an international criminal tribunal in the Congo to break the cycle of impunity. Denis Mukwege is frequently accused on X of "spreading hatred against the Tutsi" or "supporting the FDLR militia."
This example demonstrates just one of many ways violent actors appropriate postures typically adopted by peace activists, i.e. denouncing hatred and genocide. However, not all uses of denunciation are the same: among activists for democracy, justice and peace, we find uses aimed at reducing hatred and genocide. Among other actors, the uses, ironically, aim to incite hatred and genocide. By adopting these postures, violent actors are using activists’ own language as a weapon of repression. While this abuse suggests that our tools of protest and persuasion are effective, our movements must still consider certain strategies to address the problem (see below).
Large-scale harassment and disinformation
Byamungu Katema Pierre, notre camarade de la LUCHA dont l'assassinat a été manipulé par les rebelles du M23.
These campaigns targeting peace activists on social media in the Congo do not stem solely from private initiatives. A report from Clemson University in the United States reveals that the Rwandan government, which supports the M23 rebellion, has launched a disinformation campaign on X. Thousands of posts generated by fake accounts using artificial intelligence have been published to support the Rwandan position on the DRC conflict and demonize those who denounce it. Although such communication violates X's rules, no action has been taken by the social network to stop it.
Digital disinformation is a widespread phenomenon in several armed conflicts and states. In many countries, protesters denouncing Israel's crimes in Gaza are accused of anti-Semitism. This is particularly the case for Swedish activist Greta Thunberg, who was labeled anti-Semitic for calling for a "ceasefire" in the Middle East during an environmental march in November 2023.
Online disinformation campaigns polarize public debate and fuel communal hatred. Worse, they can prove fatal for the people targeted. The nonviolent citizen movement LUCHA (Struggle for Change), a victim of constant demonization on social media due to its peaceful commitment to peace, paid the ultimate price. On February 12, 2025, Byamungu Katema Pierre, a member of LUCHA, was shot dead by M23 rebels. M23 members quickly presented the victim as a militiaman killed in combat, weapon in hand. A report by Human Rights Watch revealed that the victim, along with four other militants, were forced to transport the bodies.
We will rise above the weaponization of social media
Marche de solidarité à Bruxelles en 2025. Credit: About Congo.
Whether in Gaza or the Congo, widespread disinformation via social media aims to delegitimize the voices of peace in public opinion and force them into silence. Those involved in armed conflict are thus determined to suppress truth and freedom of expression to allow the emergence of a world that responds only to their aspirations and visions. The voices of peace must not give up, and we must not walk away from our nonviolent method of struggle.
It is important to continue the fight—maintaining nonviolent discipline, always. It is true that in Gaza under Israeli bombs or in Goma, where any criticism risks a bullet in the head, nonviolent action can seem completely ineffective or dangerous. Yet this is what must be done to combat online disinformation. If our tormentors use nonviolent means of action to accuse us of being what they are—violent—it is proof that this means of struggle is more powerful than we might imagine. Furthermore, confronting disinformation requires clear and unambiguous communication. This will likely not stop smear and demonization campaigns. However, clear communication will ensure that people of good faith do not unwittingly succumb to manipulation.
Finally, we must avoid self-censorship. By conducting their massive smear campaigns on social media, those involved in armed conflict seek to silence us, especially when our voices do not support their own. They want us to give in.
Pressuring for peace in a hyperconnected environment presents new challenges. Encountering nonviolent struggle stirs up anxiety among our violent adversaries, who have fewer strategic advantages on this type of battleground.
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Ultimately, our interaction on social media is what gives these tools relevance and influence. Social media can be used in ways that effectively build and amplify people power. But when our oppressors are weaponizing these tools to further their agendas of violence and hatred, with real-life consequences for our movements, we must reconsider our online behavior, as well as the companies we wish to support vs. those we hold accountable for their complicity in violence.
